War breaks out in Europe (1939–1940) photograph reenacting the removal of the Polish border crossing in
Sopot On 1 September 1939, Germany
invaded Poland after
having staged several
false flag border incidents as a pretext to initiate the invasion. The first German attack of the war came
against the Polish defences at Westerplatte. The United Kingdom responded with an
ultimatum for Germany to cease military operations, and on 3 September, after the ultimatum was ignored, Britain and France declared war on Germany. During the
Phoney War period, the alliance provided no direct military support to Poland, outside of a
cautious French probe into the Saarland. The Western Allies also began a
naval blockade of Germany, which aimed to damage the country's economy and war effort. Germany responded by ordering
U-boat warfare against Allied merchant and warships, which would later escalate into the
Battle of the Atlantic. On 8 September, German troops reached the suburbs of
Warsaw. The
Polish counter-offensive to the west halted the German advance for several days, but it was outflanked and encircled by the
Wehrmacht. Remnants of the Polish army broke through to
besieged Warsaw. On 17 September 1939, two days after signing a
cease-fire with Japan, the
Soviet Union invaded Poland under the supposed pretext that the Polish state had ceased to exist. On 27 September, the Warsaw garrison surrendered to the Germans, and
the last large operational unit of the Polish Army surrendered on 6October. Despite the military defeat, Poland never surrendered; instead, it formed the
Polish government-in-exile and a
clandestine state apparatus remained in occupied Poland. A significant part of Polish military personnel
evacuated to Romania and Latvia; many of them later
fought against the Axis in other theatres of the war. Germany
annexed western Poland and
occupied central Poland; the Soviet Union
annexed eastern Poland. Small shares of Polish territory were transferred to
Lithuania and
Slovakia. On 6 October, Hitler made a public peace overture to the United Kingdom and France but said that the future of Poland was to be determined exclusively by Germany and the Soviet Union. The proposal was rejected and Hitler ordered an immediate offensive against France, which was postponed until the spring of 1940 due to bad weather. and
Karelian Isthmus on the last day of the
Winter War, 13 March 1940 After the outbreak of war in Poland, Stalin threatened
Estonia,
Latvia, and
Lithuania with military invasion, forcing the three
Baltic countries to sign
pacts allowing the creation of Soviet military bases in these countries; in October 1939, significant Soviet military contingents were moved there.
Finland refused to sign a similar pact and rejected ceding part of its territory to the Soviet Union.
The Soviet Union invaded Finland in November 1939, and was subsequently expelled from the
League of Nations for this crime of aggression. Despite overwhelming numerical superiority, Soviet military success during the
Winter War was modest, and the Finno–Soviet war ended in March 1940 with
some Finnish concessions of territory. In June 1940, the Soviet Union
occupied the entire territories of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, as well as the Romanian regions of
Bessarabia, Northern Bukovina, and the Hertsa region. In August 1940, Hitler imposed the
Second Vienna Award on Romania which led to the transfer of
Northern Transylvania to Hungary. In September 1940, Bulgaria demanded
Southern Dobruja from Romania with German and Italian support, leading to the
Treaty of Craiova. The loss of one-third of Romania's 1939 territory caused a coup against
King Carol II, turning Romania into a fascist dictatorship under Marshal
Ion Antonescu, with a course set towards the Axis in the hopes of a German guarantee. Meanwhile, German–Soviet political relations and economic co-operation gradually stalled, and both states began preparations for war.
Western Europe (1940–1941) (shown in dark red) In April 1940,
Germany invaded Denmark and Norway to protect shipments of
iron ore from Sweden, which the Allies were
attempting to cut off.
Denmark capitulated after six hours, and
despite Allied support, Norway was conquered within two months.
British discontent over the Norwegian campaign led to the resignation of Prime Minister
Neville Chamberlain, who was replaced by
Winston Churchill on 10May 1940. On the same day, Germany
launched an offensive against France. To circumvent the strong
Maginot Line fortifications on the Franco-German border, Germany directed its attack at the neutral nations of
Belgium,
the Netherlands, and
Luxembourg. The Germans carried out a flanking manoeuvre through the
Ardennes region, which was mistakenly perceived by the Allies as an impenetrable natural barrier against armoured vehicles. By successfully implementing new
Blitzkrieg tactics, the
Wehrmacht rapidly advanced to the Channel and cut off the Allied forces in Belgium, trapping the bulk of the Allied armies in a cauldron on the Franco-Belgian border near Lille. The United Kingdom was able
to evacuate a significant number of Allied troops from the continent by early June, although they had to abandon almost all their equipment. On 10 June,
Italy invaded France, declaring war on both France and the United Kingdom. The Germans turned south against the weakened French army, and
Paris fell to them on 14June. Eight days later
France signed an armistice with Germany; it was divided into
German and
Italian occupation zones, and an unoccupied
rump state under the
Vichy Regime, which, though officially neutral, was generally aligned with Germany. France kept its fleet, which
the United Kingdom attacked on 3July in an attempt to prevent its seizure by Germany. after the German
Blitz on 29 December 1940 The air
Battle of Britain began in early July with
Luftwaffe attacks on shipping and harbours. The
German campaign for air superiority started in August but its failure to defeat
RAF Fighter Command forced the indefinite postponement of the
proposed German invasion of Britain. The German
strategic bombing offensive intensified with night attacks on London and other cities in
the Blitz, but largely ended in May 1941 after failing to significantly disrupt the British war effort. Using newly captured French ports, the German Navy
enjoyed success against an over-extended
Royal Navy, using
U-boats against British shipping
in the Atlantic. The British
Home Fleet scored a significant victory on 27May 1941 by
sinking the German battleship Bismarck. In November 1939, the United States was assisting China and the Western Allies, and had amended the
Neutrality Act to allow "
cash and carry" purchases by the Allies. In 1940, following the German capture of Paris, the size of the
United States Navy was
significantly increased. In September the United States further agreed to a
trade of American destroyers for British bases. Still, a large majority of the American public continued to oppose any direct military intervention in the conflict well into 1941. In December 1940, President
Franklin D. Roosevelt accused Hitler of planning world conquest and ruled out any negotiations as useless, calling for the United States to become an "
arsenal of democracy" and promoting
Lend-Lease programmes of military and humanitarian aid to support the British war effort; Lend-Lease was later extended to the other Allies, including the Soviet Union after it was
invaded by Germany. The United States started strategic planning to prepare for a full-scale offensive against Germany. At the end of September 1940, the
Tripartite Pact formally united Japan, Italy, and Germany as the
Axis powers. The Tripartite Pact stipulated that any country—with the exception of the Soviet Union—that attacked any Axis Power would be forced to go to war against all three. The Axis expanded in November 1940 when
Hungary,
Slovakia, and
Romania joined.
Romania and
Hungary later made major contributions to the Axis war against the Soviet Union, in Romania's case partially to recapture
territory ceded to the Soviet Union.
Mediterranean (1940–1941) In early June 1940, the Italian
Regia Aeronautica attacked and besieged Malta, a British possession. From late summer to early autumn, Italy
conquered British Somaliland and made an
incursion into British-held Egypt. In October,
Italy attacked Greece, but the attack was repulsed with heavy Italian casualties; the campaign ended within months with minor territorial changes. To assist Italy and prevent Britain from gaining a foothold, Germany prepared to invade the Balkans, which would threaten Romanian oil fields and strike against British dominance of the Mediterranean. of the
Afrika Korps advancing across the North African desert, April 1941 In December 1940, British Empire forces began
counter-offensives against Italian forces in Egypt and
Italian East Africa. The offensives were successful; by early February 1941, Italy had lost control of eastern Libya, and large numbers of Italian troops had been taken prisoner. The
Italian Navy also suffered significant defeats, with the Royal Navy putting three Italian battleships out of commission after a
carrier attack at Taranto, and neutralising several more warships at the
Battle of Cape Matapan. Italian defeats prompted Germany to
deploy an expeditionary force to North Africa; at the end of March 1941,
Erwin Rommel's
Afrika Korps launched an offensive which drove back Commonwealth forces. In less than a month, Axis forces advanced to western Egypt and
besieged the port of Tobruk. By late March 1941,
Bulgaria and
Yugoslavia signed the
Tripartite Pact; however, the Yugoslav government was
overthrown two days later by pro-British nationalists. Germany and Italy responded with simultaneous invasions of both
Yugoslavia and
Greece, commencing on 6 April 1941 with a
massive bombing of Belgrade; both nations were forced to surrender within the month. The airborne
invasion of the Greek island of Crete at the end of May completed the German conquest of the Balkans. Partisan warfare subsequently broke out against the
Axis occupation of Yugoslavia, which continued until the end of the war. In the Middle East in May, Commonwealth forces
quashed an uprising in Iraq which had been supported by German aircraft from bases within Vichy-controlled
Syria. Between June and July, British-led forces
invaded and occupied the French possessions of Syria and Lebanon, assisted by the
Free French.
Axis attack on the Soviet Union (1941) animation map, 1939–1945 – Red:
Western Allies and the Soviet Union after 1941; Green:
Soviet Union before 1941; Blue:
Axis powers With the situation in Europe and Asia relatively stable, Germany, Japan, and the Soviet Union made preparations for war. With the Soviets wary of mounting tensions with Germany, and the Japanese planning to take advantage of the European War by seizing resource-rich European possessions in
Southeast Asia, the two powers signed the
Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact in April 1941. By contrast, the Germans were steadily making preparations for an attack on the Soviet Union, massing forces on the Soviet border. Hitler believed that the United Kingdom's refusal to end the war was based on the hope that the United States and the Soviet Union would enter the war against Germany. On 31 July 1940, Hitler decided that the Soviet Union should be eliminated and aimed for the conquest of
Ukraine, the
Baltic states and
Byelorussia. However, other senior German officials like Ribbentrop saw an opportunity to create a Euro-Asian bloc against the British Empire by inviting the Soviet Union into the Tripartite Pact. In November 1940,
negotiations took place to determine if the Soviet Union would join the pact. The Soviets showed some interest but asked for concessions from Finland, Bulgaria, Turkey, and Japan that Germany considered unacceptable. On 18 December 1940, Hitler issued the directive to prepare for an invasion of the Soviet Union. On 22 June 1941, Germany, supported by Italy and Romania, invaded the Soviet Union in
Operation Barbarossa, with Germany accusing the Soviets of
plotting against them; they were joined shortly by Finland and Hungary. The primary targets of this surprise offensive were the
Baltic region, Moscow and Ukraine, with the
ultimate goal of ending the 1941 campaign near the
Arkhangelsk–Astrakhan line—from the
Caspian to the
White Seas. Hitler's objectives were to eliminate the Soviet Union as a military power, exterminate
communism, generate
Lebensraum ("living space") by
dispossessing the native population, and guarantee access to the strategic resources needed to defeat Germany's remaining rivals. prepares to shoot a Jewish mother holding her child,
Ivangorod, Ukraine Although the
Red Army was preparing for strategic
counter-offensives before the war, Operation Barbarossa forced the
Soviet supreme command to adopt
strategic defence. During the summer, the Axis made significant gains into Soviet territory, inflicting immense losses in both personnel and materiel, mainly in massive
encirclements around
Minsk,
Smolensk, and
Uman.
Nazi policy entailed that Wehrmacht subject Soviet POWs to murderous treatment, executing all Jewish and Communist POWs immediately per the
Commissar Order, and subjecting the remainder to forced marches to open-air concentration camps, where they were to be
deliberately starved to death. By the end of the winter of 1941, 2.8 million Soviet POWs had died in German captivity. Some 3.3 million Soviet POWs would die in German captivity by the war's end in total, a nearly 60% mortality rate. By mid-August, however, the German
Army High Command decided to
suspend the offensive of a considerably depleted
Army Group Centre, and to divert the
2nd Panzer Group to reinforce troops advancing towards central Ukraine and Leningrad. The
Kiev offensive was overwhelmingly successful, resulting in encirclement and elimination of four Soviet armies, and made possible further
advance into Crimea and industrially-developed eastern Ukraine (the
First Battle of Kharkov). The diversion of three-quarters of the Axis troops and the majority of their air forces from France and the central Mediterranean to the
Eastern Front prompted the United Kingdom to reconsider its
grand strategy. In July, the UK and the Soviet Union formed a
military alliance against Germany and in August, the United Kingdom and the United States jointly issued the
Atlantic Charter, which outlined British and American goals for the post-war world. In late August the British and Soviets
invaded neutral Iran to secure the
Persian Corridor, Iran's
oil fields, and preempt any Axis advances through Iran toward the Baku oil fields or India. (
Saint Petersburg), 10 December 1942 By October, Axis powers had achieved
operational objectives in Ukraine and the Baltic region, with only the sieges of
Leningrad and
Sevastopol continuing. A major
offensive against Moscow was renewed; after two months of fierce battles in increasingly harsh weather, the German army almost reached the outer suburbs of Moscow, where the exhausted troops were forced to suspend the offensive. Large territorial gains were made by Axis forces, but their campaign had failed to achieve its main objectives: two key cities remained in Soviet hands, the Soviet
capability to resist was not broken, and the Soviet Union retained a considerable part of its military potential. The
blitzkrieg phase of the war in Europe had ended. By early December, freshly mobilised
reserves allowed the Soviets to achieve numerical parity with Axis troops. This, as well as
intelligence data which established that a minimal number of Soviet troops in the East would be sufficient to deter any attack by the Japanese
Kwantung Army, allowed the Soviets to begin a
massive counter-offensive that started on 5 December all along the front and pushed German troops west.
War breaks out in the Pacific (1941) , 8 December 1941 Following the Japanese
false flag Mukden incident in 1931, the Japanese shelling of the American
gunboat USS Panay in 1937, and the 1937–1938
Nanjing Massacre,
Japanese-American relations deteriorated. In 1939, the United States notified Japan that it would not be extending its trade treaty and American public opinion opposing Japanese expansionism led to a series of economic sanctions—the
Export Control Acts—which banned US exports of chemicals, minerals and military parts to Japan, and increased economic pressure on the Japanese regime. During 1939 Japan launched its
first attack against Changsha, but was repulsed by late September. Despite
several offensives by both sides, by 1940 the war between China and Japan was at a stalemate. To increase pressure on China by blocking supply routes, and to better position Japanese forces in the event of a war with the Western powers, Japan invaded and
occupied northern Indochina in September 1940. Chinese nationalist forces launched a large-scale
counter-offensive in early 1940. In August,
Chinese communists launched an
offensive in Central China; in retaliation, Japanese armies in North China implemented the
Three Alls Policy, a massive scorched earth initiative to depopulate regions deemed hostile to Japanese occupation. Continued antipathy between Chinese communist and nationalist forces
culminated in armed clashes in January 1941, effectively ending their co-operation. In March, the Japanese 11th army attacked the headquarters of the nationalist Chinese 19th army but was repulsed during the
Battle of Shanggao. In September, Japan attempted to
take the city of Changsha again and clashed with Chinese nationalist forces. German successes in Europe prompted Japan to increase pressure on European governments in
Southeast Asia. The Dutch government agreed to provide Japan with oil supplies from the
Dutch East Indies, but negotiations for additional access to their resources ended in failure in June 1941. In July 1941 Japan sent troops to southern Indochina, threatening British and Dutch possessions in the Far East. The United States, the United Kingdom, and other Western governments reacted to this move with a freeze on Japanese assets and a total oil
embargo. At the same time, Japan was
planning an invasion of the Soviet Far East, intending to take advantage of the German invasion in the west, but abandoned the operation after the sanctions. Since early 1941, the United States and Japan had been engaged in negotiations in an attempt to improve their strained relations and end the war in China. Japan advanced a number of proposals which were dismissed by the Americans as inadequate. At the same time the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Netherlands engaged in secret discussions for the joint defence of their territories, in the event of a Japanese attack against any of them. Roosevelt reinforced
the Philippines (an American protectorate scheduled for independence in 1946) and warned Japan that the United States would react to Japanese attacks against any "neighboring countries". Frustrated at the lack of progress and pressured by American–British–Dutch sanctions, especially in oil, Japan prepared for war. Emperor
Hirohito, after initial hesitation about Japan's chances of victory, began to favour Japan's entry into the war. As a result, Prime Minister
Fumimaro Konoe resigned. Hirohito refused the recommendation to appoint
Prince Naruhiko Higashikuni in his place, choosing War Minister
Hideki Tojo instead. On 3 November, Nagano explained in detail the plan of the
attack on Pearl Harbor to the Emperor. On 5 November, Hirohito approved in imperial conference the operations plan for the war. On 20 November, the new government presented an interim proposal as its final offer. It called for the end of American aid to China and for lifting the embargo on the supply of oil and other resources to Japan. In exchange, Japan promised not to launch any attacks in Southeast Asia and to withdraw its forces from southern Indochina. The American counter-proposal of 26 November required that Japan evacuate all of China without conditions and conclude non-aggression pacts with all Pacific powers. That meant Japan was essentially forced to choose between abandoning its ambitions in China, or seizing the natural resources it needed in the Dutch East Indies by force; the Japanese military did not consider the former an option, and many officers considered the oil embargo an unspoken declaration of war. on the
United States Pacific Fleet at
Pearl Harbor, Sunday 7 December 1941 Japan planned to seize European colonies in Asia to create a large defensive perimeter stretching into the Central Pacific. The Japanese would then be free to exploit the resources of Southeast Asia while exhausting the over-stretched Allies by fighting a defensive war. To prevent American intervention while securing the perimeter, it was further planned to neutralise the
United States Pacific Fleet and the American military presence in the Philippines from the outset. On 7 December 1941 (8 December in Asian time zones), Japan attacked British and American holdings with near-simultaneous
offensives against Southeast Asia and the Central Pacific. These included an
attack on the American fleets at Pearl Harbor and
the Philippines, as well as invasions of
Guam,
Wake Island,
Malaya,
Thailand, and
Hong Kong. These attacks led the
United States,
United Kingdom, China, Australia, and several other states to formally declare war on Japan, whereas the Soviet Union, being heavily involved in large-scale hostilities with European Axis countries, maintained its neutrality agreement with Japan. Germany, followed by the other Axis states, declared war on the United States in solidarity with Japan, citing as justification the American attacks on German war vessels that had been ordered by Roosevelt.
Axis advance stalls (1942–1943) On 1 January 1942, the
Allied Big Four—the Soviet Union, China, the United Kingdom, and the United States—and 22 smaller or exiled governments issued the
Declaration by United Nations, thereby affirming the
Atlantic Charter and agreeing not to sign a
separate peace with the Axis powers. During 1942, Allied officials debated on the appropriate
grand strategy to pursue. All agreed that
defeating Germany was the primary objective. The Americans favoured a straightforward,
large-scale attack on Germany through France. The Soviets demanded a second front. The British argued that military operations should target peripheral areas to wear out German strength, leading to increasing demoralisation, and bolstering
resistance forces; Germany itself would be subject to a heavy bombing campaign. An offensive against Germany would then be launched primarily by Allied armour, without using large-scale armies. Eventually, the British persuaded the Americans that a landing in France was infeasible in 1942 and they should instead focus on driving the Axis out of North Africa. At the
Casablanca Conference in early 1943, the Allies reiterated the statements issued in the 1942 Declaration and demanded the
unconditional surrender of their enemies. The British and Americans agreed to continue to press the initiative in the Mediterranean by invading Sicily to fully secure the Mediterranean supply routes. Although the British argued for further operations in the Balkans to bring Turkey into the war, in May 1943, the Americans extracted a British commitment to limit Allied operations in the Mediterranean to an invasion of the Italian mainland, and to invade France in 1944.
Pacific (1942–1943) Japanese forces achieved naval victories in the
South China Sea,
Java Sea, and
Indian Ocean, and
bombed the Allied naval base at
Darwin, Australia. On 16 April, 7,000 British soldiers were encircled by the Japanese 33rd Division during the
Battle of Yenangyaung in Burma and rescued by the Chinese 38th Division. Despite stubborn
resistance by Filipino and US forces, the
Philippine Commonwealth was eventually captured in May, forcing its government into exile. Following the capture of Bataan, Japanese armies forced some 75,000 Filipino and American prisoners on a
42km death march, resulting in thousands of deaths. By the end of April, Japan and its ally
Thailand had conquered
Malaya,
the Dutch East Indies,
Singapore,
Rabaul and most of
Burma, inflicting severe losses on Allied troops and taking a large number of prisoners. Japanese advances were accompanied by numerous atrocities, including the
Sook Ching Massacre in Singapore. The only Allied success against Japan was a Chinese
victory at Changsha. The Japanese victories left it overconfident and overextended. during the
Battle of Midway, 4 June 1942 In early May 1942, Japan initiated operations to
capture Port Moresby by
amphibious assault and thus sever communications and supply lines between the United States and Australia. The planned invasion was thwarted when an Allied task force, centred on two American fleet carriers, fought Japanese naval forces to a draw in the
Battle of the Coral Sea. Japan's next plan, motivated by the earlier
Doolittle Raid, was to seize
Midway Atoll and lure American carriers into battle to be eliminated; as a diversion, Japan would also send forces to
occupy the Aleutian Islands in Alaska. In mid-May, Japan started the
Zhejiang-Jiangxi campaign in China, with the goal of inflicting retribution on the Chinese who aided the surviving American airmen in the Doolittle Raid by destroying Chinese air bases and fighting against the Chinese 23rd and 32nd Army Groups. In early June, Japan put its operations into action, but the Americans had broken
Japanese naval codes in late May and were fully aware of the plans and order of battle, and used this knowledge to achieve a decisive
victory at Midway over the
Imperial Japanese Navy. With its capacity for aggressive action greatly diminished as a result of the Midway battle, Japan attempted to capture
Port Moresby by an
overland campaign in the
Territory of Papua. The Americans planned a counterattack against Japanese positions in the southern
Solomon Islands, primarily
Guadalcanal, as a first step towards capturing
Rabaul, the main Japanese base in Southeast Asia. Both plans started in July, but by mid-September, the
Battle for Guadalcanal took priority for the Japanese, and troops in New Guinea were ordered to withdraw from the Port Moresby area to the
northern part of the island, where they faced Australian and United States troops in the
Battle of Buna–Gona. Guadalcanal soon became a focal point for both sides with heavy commitments of troops and ships in the battle for Guadalcanal, with Japanese forces suffering massive losses in the attrition, especially amongst their elite pilots. By the start of 1943, the Japanese were defeated on the island and
withdrew their troops. In Burma, Commonwealth forces mounted two operations. The first was a disastrous
offensive into the Arakan region in late 1942 that forced a retreat back to India by May 1943. The second was the
insertion of irregular forces behind Japanese frontlines in February which, by the end of April, had achieved mixed results.
Eastern Front (1942–1943) Despite considerable losses, in early 1942 Germany and its allies stopped a major Soviet offensive in
central and
southern Russia, keeping most territorial gains they had achieved during the previous year. In May, the Germans defeated Soviet offensives in the
Kerch Peninsula and at
Kharkov. The fortress city of Sevastopol, which the Red Army had held out against Axis siege for nearly 250 days, was finally seized with the use of massive artillery bombardments and poison gas. In June 1942 Germany launched its main
summer offensive against southern Russia, to seize the
oil fields of the Caucasus and occupy the
Kuban steppe, while maintaining positions on the northern and central areas of the front. The Germans split
Army Group South into two groups:
Army Group A advanced to the lower
Don River and struck south-east to the Caucasus, while
Army Group B headed towards the
Volga River. The Soviet Union decided to make its stand at Stalingrad on the Volga. soldiers on the counterattack during the
Battle of Stalingrad, February 1943 By mid-November, the Germans had
nearly taken Stalingrad in bitter
street fighting. The Soviet Union began its second winter counter-offensive, starting with an
encirclement of the German Sixth Army at Stalingrad, and an assault on the
Rzhev salient near Moscow, though the latter failed. By early February 1943, the German army had taken tremendous losses; German troops at Stalingrad had been defeated, and the front-line had been pushed back beyond its position before the summer offensive. In mid-February, after the Soviet push had tapered off, the Germans launched another
attack on Kharkov, creating a
salient in their front line around the Soviet city of
Kursk.
Western Europe/Atlantic and Mediterranean (1942–1943) Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress bombing raid on the Focke-Wulf factory in Germany, 9 October 1943 Exploiting poor American naval command decisions,
the German navy ravaged Allied shipping off the American Atlantic coast. By November 1941, Commonwealth forces had launched a counter-offensive in North Africa,
Operation Crusader, and reclaimed all the gains the Germans and Italians had made. The Germans also launched a North African offensive in January, pushing the British back to positions at the
Gazala line by early February, followed by a temporary lull in combat which Germany used to prepare for their upcoming offensives. Concerns that the Japanese might use bases in
Vichy-held Madagascar caused the British to
invade the island in early May 1942. An Axis
offensive in Libya forced an Allied retreat deep inside Egypt until Axis forces were
stopped at El Alamein. On the Continent, raids of Allied
commandos on strategic targets, culminating in the failed
Dieppe Raid, demonstrated the Western Allies' inability to launch an invasion of continental Europe without much better preparation, equipment, and operational security. In August 1942, the Allies succeeded in repelling a
second attack against El Alamein and, at a high cost, managed to
deliver desperately needed supplies to the besieged Malta. A few months later, the Allies
commenced an attack of their own in Egypt, dislodging the Axis forces and beginning a drive west across Libya. This attack was followed up shortly after by
Anglo-American landings in French North Africa, which resulted in the region joining the Allies. Hitler responded to the French colony's defection by ordering the
occupation of Vichy France; although Vichy forces did not resist this violation of the armistice, they managed to
scuttle their fleet to prevent its capture by German forces. Axis forces in Africa withdrew into
Tunisia, which was
conquered by the Allies in May 1943. In June 1943, the British and Americans began
a strategic bombing campaign against Germany with a goal to disrupt the war economy, reduce morale, and "
de-house" the civilian population. The
firebombing of Hamburg was among the first attacks in this campaign, inflicting significant casualties and considerable losses on infrastructure of this important industrial centre.
Allies gain momentum (1943–1944) SBD-5 scout/
dive bomber flying patrol over and during the
Gilbert and Marshall Islands campaign, 1943 After the Guadalcanal campaign, the Allies initiated several operations against Japan in the Pacific. In May 1943, Canadian and US forces were sent to
eliminate Japanese forces from the Aleutians. Soon after, the United States, with support from Australia, New Zealand and Pacific Islander forces, began major ground, sea and air operations to
isolate Rabaul by capturing surrounding islands, and
breach the Japanese Central Pacific perimeter at the Gilbert and Marshall Islands. By the end of March 1944, the Allies had completed both of these objectives and had also
neutralised the major Japanese base at Truk in the
Caroline Islands. In April, the Allies launched an operation to
retake Western New Guinea. In the Soviet Union, both the Germans and the Soviets spent the spring and early summer of 1943 preparing for large offensives in
central Russia. On 5 July 1943, Germany
attacked Soviet forces around the Kursk Bulge. Within a week, German forces had exhausted themselves against the Soviets' well-constructed defences, and for the first time in the war, Hitler cancelled an operation before it had achieved tactical or operational success. This decision was partially affected by the Western Allies'
invasion of Sicily launched on 9 July, which, combined with previous Italian failures, resulted in the
ousting and arrest of Mussolini later that month. troops behind
T34/76(1942 variant) in a counter-offensive on German positions at the
Battle of Kursk, July 1943 On 12 July 1943, the Soviets launched their own
counter-offensives, thereby nearly completely dispelling any chance of German victory or even stalemate in the east. The Soviet victory at Kursk marked the end of German superiority, giving the Soviet Union the initiative on the Eastern Front. The Germans tried to stabilise their eastern front along the hastily fortified
Panther–Wotan line, but the Soviets broke through it at
Smolensk and the
Lower Dnieper Offensive. On 3 September 1943, the Western Allies
invaded the Italian mainland, following
Italy's armistice with the Allies and the ensuing German occupation of Italy. Germany, with the help of local fascists, responded to the armistice by
disarming Italian forces that were in many places without superior orders, seizing military control of Italian areas, and creating a series of defensive lines. German special forces then
rescued Mussolini, who then soon established a new client state in German-occupied Italy named the
Italian Social Republic, causing an
Italian civil war. The Western Allies fought through several lines until reaching the
main German defensive line in mid-November. German operations in the Atlantic also suffered. By
May 1943, as Allied counter-measures became increasingly effective, the resulting sizeable German submarine losses forced a temporary halt of the German Atlantic naval campaign. In November 1943,
Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill met with
Chiang Kai-shek in Cairo and then with Joseph Stalin
in Tehran. The former conference determined the post-war return of Japanese territory and the military planning for the
Burma campaign, while the latter included agreement that the Western Allies would invade Europe in 1944 and that the Soviet Union would declare war on Japan within three months of Germany's defeat. From November 1943, during the seven-week
Battle of Changde, the Chinese awaited Allied relief as they forced Japan to fight a costly war of attrition. In January 1944, the Allies launched a
series of attacks in Italy against the line at Monte Cassino and tried to outflank it with
landings at Anzio. On 27 January 1944,
Soviet troops launched
a major offensive that expelled German forces from the
Leningrad region, thereby ending the
most lethal siege in history. The
following Soviet offensive was
halted on the pre-war Estonian border by the German
Army Group North aided by
Estonians hoping to
re-establish national independence. This delay slowed subsequent Soviet operations in the
Baltic Sea region. By late May 1944, the Soviets had
liberated Crimea,
largely expelled Axis forces from Ukraine, and made
incursions into Romania, which were repulsed by the Axis troops. The Allied offensives in Italy had succeeded and, at the cost of allowing several German divisions to retreat, Rome was captured on 4 June. The Allies had mixed success in mainland Asia. In March 1944, the Japanese launched the first of two invasions,
an operation against Allied positions in Assam, India, and soon besieged Commonwealth positions at
Imphal and
Kohima. In May 1944, British and Indian forces mounted a counter-offensive that drove Japanese troops back to Burma by July, The
second Japanese invasion of China aimed to destroy China's main fighting forces, secure railways between Japanese-held territory and capture Allied airfields. By June, the Japanese had conquered the province of
Henan and begun a
new attack on Changsha.
Allies Offensives (1944) during the
invasion of Normandy on
D-Day, 6 June 1944 On 6 June 1944 (commonly known as
D-Day), after three years of Soviet pressure, the Western Allies
invaded northern France. After reassigning several Allied divisions from Italy, they also
attacked southern France. These landings were successful and led to the defeat of the
German Army units in France.
Paris was
liberated on 25 August by the
local resistance assisted by the
Free French Forces, both led by General
Charles de Gaulle, and the Western Allies continued to
push back German forces in western Europe during the latter part of the year. An attempt to advance into northern Germany spearheaded by
a major airborne operation in the Netherlands failed. After that, the Western Allies slowly pushed into Germany, but
failed to cross the Roer river. In Italy, the Allied advance slowed due to the
last major German defensive line. On 22 June, the Soviets launched
a strategic offensive in Belarus that nearly destroyed the German
Army Group Centre. Soon after that,
another Soviet strategic offensive forced German troops from Western Ukraine and Eastern Poland. The Soviet Red Army however halted in the
Praga district on the other side of the
Vistula as the Germans quelled the
Warsaw Uprising initiated by the
Home Army (the main faction of the
Polish resistance, loyal to the non-communist government-in exile), killing over 150,000 Poles. The
national uprising in
Slovakia was also quelled by the Germans. The Soviet
Red Army's
strategic offensive in eastern Romania cut off and destroyed the
considerable German troops there and triggered
a successful coup d'état in Romania and
in Bulgaria, followed by those countries' shift to the Allied side.
Douglas MacArthur returns to the
Philippines during the
Battle of Leyte, 20 October 1944 In September 1944, Soviet troops advanced into
Yugoslavia and forced the rapid withdrawal of German Army Groups
E and
F in
Greece,
Albania, and Yugoslavia to rescue them from being cut off. By this point, the communist-led
Partisans under Marshal
Josip Broz Tito, who had led an
increasingly successful guerrilla campaign against the occupation since 1941, controlled much of the territory of Yugoslavia and engaged in delaying efforts against German forces further south. In northern
Serbia, the Soviet
Red Army, with limited support from Bulgarian forces, assisted the Partisans in a joint
liberation of the capital city of Belgrade on 20 October. A few days later, the Soviets launched a
massive assault against
German-occupied Hungary that lasted until
the fall of Budapest in February 1945. Unlike rapid Soviet victories in the Balkans,
bitter Finnish resistance to the
Soviet offensive in the
Karelian Isthmus denied the Soviets occupation of Finland and led to a
Soviet-Finnish armistice on relatively mild conditions, although Finland was obligated to
fight their German former allies. By the start of July 1944, Commonwealth forces in Southeast Asia had repelled the Japanese sieges in
Assam, pushing the Japanese back to the
Chindwin River while the Chinese captured Myitkyina. In September 1944, Chinese forces
captured Mount Song and reopened the
Burma Road. In China, the Japanese had more successes, having finally
captured Changsha in mid-June and the city of
Hengyang by early August. Soon after, they invaded the province of
Guangxi, winning major engagements against Chinese forces at
Guilin and Liuzhou by the end of November and successfully linking up their forces in China and Indochina by mid-December. In the Pacific, US forces continued to push back the Japanese perimeter. In mid-June 1944, they began their
offensive against the Mariana and Palau islands and decisively defeated Japanese forces in the
Battle of the Philippine Sea. These defeats led to the resignation of the Japanese Prime Minister,
Hideki Tojo, and provided the United States with air bases to launch intensive heavy bomber attacks on the Japanese home islands. In late October, American forces
invaded the Filipino island of Leyte; soon after, Allied naval forces scored another large victory in the
Battle of Leyte Gulf, one of the largest naval battles in history.
Axis collapse and Allied victory (1944–1945) held in February 1945, with
Winston Churchill,
Franklin D. Roosevelt, and
Joseph Stalin On 16 December 1944, Germany made a last attempt to split the Allies on the Western Front by using most of its remaining reserves to launch
a massive counter-offensive in the Ardennes and
along the French-German border, hoping to encircle large portions of Western Allied troops and prompt a political settlement after capturing their primary supply port at
Antwerp. By 16 January 1945, this offensive had been repulsed with no strategic objectives fulfilled. In Italy, the Western Allies remained stalemated at the German defensive line. In mid-January 1945, the Red Army attacked in Poland,
pushing from the Vistula to the Oder river in Germany, and
overran East Prussia. On 4 February Soviet, British, and US leaders met for the
Yalta Conference. They agreed on the occupation of post-war Germany, and on when the Soviet Union would join the war against Japan. In February, the Soviets
entered Silesia and
Pomerania, while the
Western Allies entered western Germany and closed to the
Rhine river. By March, the Western Allies crossed the Rhine
north and
south of the
Ruhr,
encircling the German Army Group B. In early March, in an attempt to protect its last oil reserves in Hungary and retake Budapest, Germany launched
its last major offensive against Soviet troops near
Lake Balaton. Within two weeks, the offensive had been repulsed, the Soviets advanced to
Vienna, and captured the city. In early April, Soviet troops
captured Königsberg, while the Western Allies finally
pushed forward in Italy and swept across western Germany capturing
Hamburg and
Nuremberg.
American and Soviet forces met at the Elbe river on 25 April, leaving unoccupied pockets in southern Germany and around Berlin. Soviet troops
stormed and captured Berlin in late April. In Italy,
German forces surrendered on 29 April, while the
Italian Social Republic capitulated two days later. On 30 April, the
Reichstag was captured, signalling the military defeat of Nazi Germany. Major changes in leadership occurred on both sides during this period. On 12 April, President Roosevelt died and was succeeded by his vice president,
Harry S. Truman. Benito Mussolini
was killed by
Italian partisans on 28 April. On 30 April,
Hitler committed suicide in his
headquarters, and was succeeded by
Grand Admiral Karl Dönitz (as
President of the Reich) and
Joseph Goebbels (as
Chancellor of the Reich). Goebbels also committed suicide on the following day and was replaced by
Lutz Graf Schwerin von Krosigk, in what would later be known as the
Flensburg Government.
Total and unconditional surrender in Europe was signed
on 7and 8May, to be effective by the end of
8 May. German Army Group Centre
resisted in Prague until 11 May. On 23 May, all remaining members of the German government were arrested by Allied forces in
Flensburg. On 5 June, all German political and military institutions were placed under Allied control through the
Berlin Declaration. , 1945 In the Pacific theatre, American forces accompanied by the forces of the
Philippine Commonwealth advanced
in the Philippines,
clearing Leyte by the end of April 1945. They
landed on Luzon in January 1945 and
recaptured Manila in March, during which Japanese forces
killed 100,000 Filipino civilians in the city. Fighting continued on Luzon,
Mindanao, and other islands of the Philippines until the
end of the war. Meanwhile, the
United States Army Air Forces launched
a massive firebombing campaign of strategic cities in Japan in an effort to destroy Japanese war industry and civilian morale. A devastating
bombing raid on Tokyo of 9–10 March was the deadliest conventional bombing raid in history. In May 1945, Australian troops
landed in Borneo, overrunning the oilfields there. British, American, and Chinese forces defeated the Japanese in northern
Burma in March, and the British pushed on to reach
Rangoon by 3 May. Chinese forces started a counterattack in the
Battle of West Hunan that occurred between 6 April and 7 June 1945. American naval and amphibious forces also moved towards Japan, taking
Iwo Jima by March, and
Okinawa by the end of June. At the same time, a naval blockade by
submarines was strangling Japan's economy and drastically reducing its ability to supply overseas forces. On 11 July, Allied leaders
met in Potsdam, Germany. They
confirmed earlier agreements about Germany, and the American, British and Chinese governments reiterated the demand for unconditional surrender of Japan, specifically stating that "
the alternative for Japan is prompt and utter destruction". During this conference, the United Kingdom
held its general election, and
Clement Attlee replaced Churchill as Prime Minister. signs the
Japanese Instrument of Surrender on board , 2 September 1945 The call for unconditional surrender was rejected by the Japanese government, which believed it would be capable of negotiating for more favourable surrender terms. In early August, the United States
dropped atomic bombs on the Japanese cities of
Hiroshima and
Nagasaki. Between the two bombings, the Soviets, pursuant to the Yalta agreement,
declared war on Japan,
invaded Japanese-held Manchuria and quickly defeated the
Kwantung Army, which was the largest Japanese fighting force. These two events persuaded previously adamant Imperial Army leaders to accept surrender terms. The Red Army also captured the
southern part of Sakhalin Island and the
Kuril Islands. On the night of 9–10 August 1945, Emperor Hirohito ordered the Japanese cabinet to accept the terms demanded by the Allies in the
Potsdam Declaration. On 15 August, the Emperor communicated this decision to the Japanese people through a speech broadcast on the radio (
Gyokuon-hōsō, literally "broadcast in the Emperor's voice"). On 15 August 1945,
Japan surrendered, with the
surrender documents finally signed at
Tokyo Bay on the deck of the American battleship on 2 September 1945, ending the war. == Aftermath ==